Rayana Plancarte ended her final regular season for Pitman soccer with another outstanding performance on Thursday after her team hosted Turlock High.
Plancarte finished the game with an assist to Serena Walls for the first score and followed that up after a spectacular goal with under 10 minutes remaining and the Pride beat the Bulldogs for the second consecutive time this year 2-0.
“It was a very exciting game, back and forth and obviously Turlock is great and are a well coached team,” said Pitman head coach Cris Castro. “Not a perfect game by any means but we kept the pressure on them until the end.”
“It was what we expected in this rivalry game, one of those games that could have gone any way,” said Turlock coach Temo Arteaga. “Whoever put that one goal in was going to win the game, I don't know how many chances we had but we just couldn't finish.”
Turlock finishes the regular season in fourth place in the Central California Conference at 7-5-3 and were eliminated from playoff contention after the loss, while Pitman secures their second place position in the CCC at 10-1-4, clinching a playoff berth last week.
“I knew we would be competitive but to find ourselves here at the end of the year... it’s nice that we will have at least one more game despite what the outcome of this game was,” said Castro.
The first half was a blur of Pitman's attack bombarding the penalty area with a large sum of players attacking at Turlock goalkeeper Jadyn Tubbs, who finished with double digit saves.
Although the effort for the first half was there along with the consistent defense of Turlock, Pitman just kept on grinding until something went through.
It took 59 minutes for anybody to score. Finally in the second half, Plancarte was able to find Walls, who had been sprinting down into the penalty area from about 40 yards out.
Normally a defender, Walls was able to take the perfect through pass from Plancarte and gently laid it at the back corner, beating Tubbs and putting her team up 1-0.
About 11 minutes after going up 1-0, Plancarte did what she does best — score.
From 30 yards out, Plancarte kept her steady pace and sprinted inside the goalie’s box, only to pump fake a shot, but by then, Tubbs and the defender had fallen over, allowing Plancarte to simply lob a gentle shot over them and into the back of the net for the game sealer.
Pitman's first round playoff game in the Division I CIF Sac-Joaquin Section tournament will take place against an opponent yet to be named and a place yet to be determined on Tuesday at a time yet determined.
